


Let's Play!

by Shawnathin93



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Additional characters will be added as I introduce them, M/M, Rating may change for future chapters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-25
Updated: 2016-01-10
Packaged: 2018-04-28 04:04:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 13,672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5077081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shawnathin93/pseuds/Shawnathin93
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eren Jaeger is an aspiring YouTuber, with less than a thousand subscribers to his name. Levi is a well known Let's Player with millions of fans. Oh, and Eren is one of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Bedtime Stories

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys! I suddenly got the inspiration to want to write today, so I decided to give this one a go! It's a fic I've been thinking about for a while, and I have a lot of things already planned out. So if you like it, Kudos and Comments are much appreciated! 
> 
> (Also Levi is pretty much Markeplier for this chapter. It's where I got the inspiration for his character traits.)

 

 

_“Shit. Shit I fucked up. Sam, looks like it’s down to you..._

 

_I can’t believe I just opened that trap door. I didn’t even think about it. Those noises obviously weren’t human, and even if they were, Wendigos can mimic human sounds..._

 

_Poor Mike, that thing really fucked him up..._

 

_Okay, Sam, we’re looking for totems here. I have missed about five so far, and you guys told me last video how important they are in seeing future events, so I’ve decided to spend extra time loo-Ahh! There’s one..._

 

_A death totem, that sounds…lovely. I’m sure nothing could possibly go wrong with that one...”_

 

Eren Jaeger was laying sideways in his bed curled up in a ball, watching transfixed as his favorite YouTuber, RivalRivaille, went through a let’s play of _Until Dawn._ He didn’t own a PlayStation himself and thus couldn’t play the game, but he was super excited that he could play vicariously through someone else. Each time RivalRivaille made a risky decision, or did something that was probably a mistake, Eren would scream, yell, and whisper advice even though he knew the other couldn’t hear.

 

_“You know what, guys, I think you were right. The totem really saved my, and more importantly, Sam’s, ass on that one. Alright, ladies and gentlemen, I think that is a great place to stop. We’re nearing the end of this series, so I want everyone to post down below what should take over as the next Tuesday Let’s Play video. As always, please like, comment, and if you’re new, subscribe! I’ll see you guys next week! Say bye Sam!”_

 

A short while later, the video ended. Eren had turned the auto-play function off as he thought he’d be falling asleep to the video, but now that it was over, he was completely awake. After a moment of hesitation, he lazily got out of bed and made his way over to his computer chair. Moving his mouse over to the bottom right corner, he exited out of the video, and when he hovered over the ‘subscribe’ button, saw that RivalRivaille had over five million subscribers. _Five million subscribers. That’s absolutely insane. The amount of money and attention he must be getting for each and every video he uploads has to be insane. Someday, I hope I can come even a little close to those numbers on my own channel._

 

Content with that thought, he returned to YouTube’s homepage. He then clicked on the subscription button and saw that he had about five videos to watch until he was caught up on all of his favorite YouTubers. He looked over at the clock, and dread filled him. _2:13 in the morning_.

 

Sighing, he hovered over each video until the ‘watch later’ feature popped up, and clicked on each in turn. _God dammit Mikasa, making me do my homework. Now I’m super behind on these videos. Oh well, I won’t be able to get to them tonight, but at least I have them all tabbed for later so I don’t forget and let them start piling up again._

 

See, for normal people, letting videos pile up was great, as it meant getting to binge watch through tons of videos without having to wait for more. In Eren’s case, however, he subscribed to so many YouTubers that he didn’t really have time for that. What with college, work, socializing, eating, sleeping, and all the other daily activities in life, Eren had to carefully choose which series to start, and had to make sure he was on top of watching them.

 

He clicked on the little dashes next to the YouTube logo, and then clicked on ‘My Channel’. Going over to the about page, he saw that he’d gotten another two subscribers that day. _Sweet! 984 subscribers! Only sixteen more to go, and I’ll be over the hump. The big and scary one-thousand. I should do a thousand subscribers video. Maybe that one will get me a ton of views._

 

He panned over to his videos page, and scrolled through. He had about a hundred videos uploaded, going through series after series in the hopes of increasing his view count. He’d finished every let’s play he’d started too. It hadn’t worked very well, however. He looked at his latest video; the one he’d uploaded earlier that day. It was a let’s play for a modded Minecraft pack. _72 views_ , he thought. _I wonder when those numbers will really start increasing. 72 views in a matter of hours is pretty good considering I’ve had this channel less than a year…I just want to know that my videos are being watched._

 

Eren honestly didn’t care about the popularity. He didn’t care about how much money could be made (though it was a nice bonus), and he didn’t care about the view count. Sure, the comments that some people made about him, saying he was super great and helpful, funny, etc., were great and all, but the only thing he really cared about was that people liked what they were watching. It made all the time, painstaking effort, and money he spent on each video worth every single second. Knowing that he was making a difference to other people gave him a ton of satisfaction. It was purely selfish, however, as their reactions made him feel so… _good._ As long as people loved what he produced, he was happy.

 

By now, it was close to 2:30 in the morning, and Eren had made a promise to himself that no matter what, he would be asleep by 3:00 every night, save for the all-nighters spent cramming for an exam. He closed out of all the tabs open on his computer, and then lazily threw himself onto his bed. Curling himself up into his previous position, this time wrapped in blankets, he started thinking about what life would be like if he were the one with millions of subscribers.

 

_Life would be totally different. I wouldn’t have to worry about school, work, or any other time consuming, useless aspect of life. I could just play games all day, get paid for it, and have millions of people watching my videos. I wonder if that’s how it is for him…I bet that’s all he does…I wonder what he looks like. He’s never shown his face in videos, twitter, or anything else, so the world only knows him by his voice. He could stroll down the street, go anywhere he wants, and still not get recognized because no one knows what he looks like. That must be the life. Someday…someday I’ll get there._

 

And with that happy notion in his head, he fell into a deep, peaceful sleep. 


	2. The Longest Upload

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow! I'm glad so many people liked the first chapter. Here's the second, a little early, but I was really excited to continue this series!
> 
> As always, comments and kudos are always super appreciated. :)

 

 

_Hello, everyone, and welcome back to another episode of Let’s Play Modded Minecraft. This has to be something like episode…what…twenty? I noticed in the last video, some of you guys wanted me to build a quarry, so that’s what we’re going to do today. We don’t really have enough diamonds, though, so I thought I’d build what’s known as a…_

 

Eren sat in his chair, microphone close to his face as he recorded the next episode in his series. The video from the previous day, to his surprise, had gotten over a hundred hits in total. _I can’t believe I can already upload something and get over a hundred people who want to see my material. Under any other circumstances, that would be a huge deal. But this is YouTube, and I can do much better._

 

He continued recording his video, not paying attention to time, and knowing that if the video was too long, he could just cut it into several smaller videos later. He didn’t really have a signature introduction on each video yet, or an outro for that matter, so splicing down one video into several wasn’t really going to hurt him or his viewers.

 

As he was just beginning to wrap up the video, he heard the jingle of keys, and a few seconds later he heard the sound of the door down the hallway open. He paused his video, making a mental note to cut that bit out later, and heard a “Oh Helloooooo!” coming from outside his door. The person had extended the end of the word hello, sounding almost singsong-like.

 

Eren smiled as he rotated his chair to get up and open the door. To his surprise, his roommate Armin decided to do it for him, very loudly.

 

“Oh hey Eren stop masturbating I’m hooooooommeeeeee!” Armin said, entering the room with a flourish of his jacket.

 

Eren made himself look all nervous, and pretended to zip up his pants. “S-so-sorry, Armin. I was just looking at photos of you and I just…got carried away.” He then looked over; just to make sure his recording software was paused. Nothing like some good ol’ embarrassing commentary to make him lose all his followers.

 

Armin giggled his perfect little giggle. “We both know you couldn’t ever get this perfect piece of ass. Also, only one of us has access to those…photos.” He winked, before turning to leave. “I see you’re recording, so I’ll leave you to that. Want to do something later?”

 

“Sure. I’m almost done, actually. What were you thinking?”

 

“I don’t know. We could always watch a movie, or something. Or…we could actually go out and hit the town like normal people.”

 

Armin looked at Eren.

 

Eren looked at Armin.

 

They both started laughing. Neither of them ever wanted anything to do with the outside world. Apart from shopping, school, work, and the occasional social gathering, they almost never went out.  Eren knew that he’d chosen his roommate perfectly. Someone just like him, who enjoyed the comfort of his own introverted life.

 

“I think I’m going to have to pass on that tonight. Maybe next time.” Eren replied, feigning a look of sadness on his face.

 

Armin too tried his best to look sad, before giving Eren another wink and saying, “Okay. Well, I guess if that’s how you feel, we can go out some other night. I’ll try asking again in a few years. Finish up your recording and we’ll do something. Maybe we could order takeout tonight. I’ll stay quiet for the next few minutes so you aren’t interrupted, though.” With that, he left the room.

 

Eren smiled at the place where Armin had been. _I really couldn’t have asked for a better roommate. He’s absolutely perfect when it comes to chores and keeping his grades up, but he knows how to let loose and have a fun time. He’s also the most loyal person I’ve ever met, and his support for everything I do is unparalleled. Whoa, look at me using such big words._

 

Eren snorted at his own internal commentary. It was true, though. Armin was going to make someone very happy someday. He knew it wouldn’t be him though. They had been best friends for a long time, and though both of them were gay (Well, Armin was bi), Eren could never lay a finger on the other. They were just too…close. And he couldn’t be happier with that.

 

Turning, Eren took a deep breath, un-paused the software, and continued recording. With editing software, pausing, breaking, and cutting videos was easier than ever. When he’d first started recording, he hadn’t had those luxuries, and had to restart a video every time something went wrong. He was thankful that he’d been able to pick up enough shifts to afford both a new microphone and software to match.

 

Both he and Armin worked at a little restaurant right down the street from where they lived. They had both applied a few years back, nervous as hell as this was their first time applying for a job. Surprisingly, both of them had been hired, even though Eren had been rather…vocal…about what he thought about management ‘giving him shit’, as he put it.

 

Once the recording was done, he opened up his software, and set to work editing his video. He wasn’t the type to put any flashy edits in; he really only put transitions between his cuts, so the video had some fluidity to it. This was his favorite part of the whole YouTube process. His video was recorded, and now all he had to do was make it look pretty, and he could start uploading.

 

He finished his editing in about twenty minutes, and satisfied with the result, dragged it from his “Work in progress” folder to his “Completed HAZAH” folder. Clicking on it, he was ecstatic to see he had eight episodes ready to upload. _Hah, Armin. Look who’s not procrastinating now. I have uploads ready for days. Weeks! I will be the god of this new world!_ Wait…wrong one.

 

A few clicks and tags later, his video was uploading. His internet wasn’t horrible, but it still took an hour or so to upload his videos. The one good thing about his internet was that he could still browse YouTube while he was uploading.

 

He opened a new tab, and hitting the ‘f’ key, was instantly taken to Facebook. Within what felt like seconds, he was bored, and the ‘t’ took him to Twitter, shortly followed by Tumblr. He spent a good fifteen minutes there, reblogging his daily dose of gay, and then a quick ‘y’ later, landed himself on the YouTube homepage.

 

He started scrolling through his subscriptions, making mental notes of what to watch that night, when he saw that he’d missed one of RivalRivaille’s weekly vlogs. The guy never actually showed himself; he mostly just talked over games he’d been playing that week, but Eren still loved watching the videos. He knew it was stalkerish, but he wanted to know as much as possible about his favorite YouTuber. 

 

The vlog was pretty ordinary, RivalRivaille talked about all of his weekly activities, and plans for the new video. At the end of the show, though, he finished with a, “Please comment down below, and let me know what game you think I should play next!”

 

Eren thought about it. He’d never commented before, for fear that it would be downvoted to oblivion, or just forgotten about altogether.  This time, though, he had an idea of what he wanted to say. RivalRivaille had hundreds of videos. He uploaded almost daily, and his commentary was always very interesting. The funny thing was, he’d never done a Minecraft video. Not a single Let’s Play, Let’s Look At, or anything.

 

Eren went down to the comments, which he knew were coming in by the nanosecond, and without thinking, typed “You should do a Minecraft let’s play! You’ve never done one before, and I think people would really like it! Minecraft is also really easy to record, and get a ton of episodes going. Think about it :D”

 

He looked at the smiley face at the end of the sentence. Should he keep it? Was it too much? Did it make the entire comment look childish?

 

Sighing, he hit the backspace button three times, and settled for “Think about it.” With that, he was content, and nervously hit the ‘post’ button.

 

He clicked on his other tab, and seeing that the video wouldn’t be uploaded for half an hour, decided to join his other roommate, even though he knew they’d end up doing the same thing he could do from the comfort of his own, secluded bedroom.

 

_I know he’ll never see my comment, but at least I can dream, right?_

 

 


	3. Cold, dead shock

 

 

Eren woke up the next morning, and after a nice little two hour lazy lay-and-do-nothing session, he had a mental war with his brain to get up and make breakfast. Well, brunch to be more specific. It was, after all, nearly one in the afternoon. He lazily sat up, defeated, and went over to his dresser. He could just go into the kitchen in his underwear, Armin would never care, but it was somewhat cold and he wasn’t having any of it.

 

He went through his clothes until he found his favorite pajamas. They were a matching top and bottom set of starry clothes, with tons of different constellations painted on. He loved wearing them, mostly because of how cool he thought they looked, but also because of how much they hugged his body and made him feel warm. Recording in them was the best.

 

Content in his PJs, he made his way out of his room, down the hall, and into the kitchen. Armin was sitting in a chair next to the counter, drinking tea, and reading the local paper. Eren never understood why he chose to; especially with all of the technology they had at their disposal. Every time he brought it up, Armin would simply say “It just feels so much better reading news from a real paper as opposed to a tiny screen.”

 

He looked up, and after giving Eren a disapproving look at his choice of attire, looked back down at his paper and continued reading.

 

“Woah woah woah, what was that look for?” Eren said, a sly grin on his face.

 

“Well, it looks like someone just threw up all over you, so it might have something to do with that. Or it could be something I read in the paper, that I just remembered. Who knows.”

 

Eren gave his roommate a hurt expression, then let the smile take over his face. Turning, he pulled out eggs, toast, bacon, and some pancake mix. He had decided on a traditional breakfast during his two hour lay-and-do-nothing session. _See, I can be productive no matter what I do!_

 

“You hungry?” Eren asked over his shoulder.

 

“I could eat. Whatcha making?”

 

“It’s a surprise!”

 

“Oh, so eggs, bacon, toast, and pancakes?”

 

Eren scowled. _Fuck him._

 

He put the bacon in the frying pan, and while that was heating up, started beating the eggs. He pretty much only ever ate them scrambled. Opening the fridge, he grabbed the milk, and poured some into the eggs. It made them fluffier, as well as taste better.

 

Once the breakfast was complete, he grabbed two plates, cups, and cutlery, and dished him and his roommate up. He put them in front of Armin, letting the smell get his attention.

 

Armin looked up. “Wow, I can’t believe you made this! I am so surprised! Who would have guessed? Me? Nope.”

 

Eren punched him on the shoulder, lightly.

 

“Ow. Anyway, thanks for breakfast. What are you going to do with your Saturday?”

 

“Not sure, actually. I might just spend my evening recording. I’ve got a lot of catching up to do watching videos as well. It might just be a ‘lock myself in my room’ kind of day.”

 

Armin sighed. “Yeah, I wish I could be as lucky. I have to be at work in about an hour though. I won’t be home until late. Maybe if you finish in time, we can go catch a movie or something?”

 

“Yeah, that sounds good actually. I heard there’s a pretty great one that just came out involving vampires and Vin Diesel.”

 

“No. Eren no. It got like a fifteen percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes. I refuse to see it.”

 

“Oh come onnnn” Eren said, batting his eyes at Armin.

 

Armin just gave him an expression that clearly told him he’d rather spend the evening alone, then continued reading his paper.

 

Eren grabbed his breakfast, and then headed to his room. _I’ll be able to knock out a few of the videos while I eat, at least. Then once I’m done, I’ll probably record some more Minecraft._

 

He set his food on his desk, turned his monitor on, and sat down. _Nice, time to settle in and watch some of my favorite YouTubers._ He typed his ‘y’ into the search box, and hit enter. YouTube instantly popped up. _I really love Google Chrome for tha-_

 

He stopped. Dead in his tracks, mid thought. He lost the ability to think, to move.

 

He had over five hundred notifications in his box. The little box was just…full. In the past, the most he’d ever had was four. And that had been a huge deal to him. He remembered the feeling of excitement, knowing at least four things had happened involving his channel. But… _five hundred?_

 

After a moment, he regained the feeling in his hands. Shakily, he moved his cursor over to the notification window, and clicked.

 

They were all comments.

 

Well, nearly all of them. He noticed that there was only one or two that didn’t involve comments. He clicked on one of them, and was brought to RivalRivaille’s video he’d commented on from the previous day. He saw his comment had over three hundred likes on it, which would have amazed him, if it weren’t for the first reply after his post.

 

_Actually, I’ve been thinking about doing just that. I just haven’t ever been able to get into MineCraft because I don’t know enough about it._

-          _RivalRivaille_

 

RivalRivaille had commented on his post. His. He had noticed him. RivalRivaille had noticed…him.

 

Shakily, he read through all of the comments that people had made after his idol had commented. They ranged from people agreeing, to people getting really upset with him for asking RivalRivaille to do something he’d never done before.

 

The comments didn’t really bother him. Over the years, he’d gotten many comments that came from people who were clearly very upset with their own lives. He’d learned to shrug them off like they were nothing.

 

He did notice that there weren’t over five hundred comments on the post, however. So he knew that the comments had to be somewhere else. Clicking on the notification box, he saw that his videos had also gotten tons of comments. He clicked on his channel, and was once again put to a stop by shock.

 

Overnight, his 984 subscribers and twenty thousand views had increased to over ten thousand subscribers, and nearly two hundred thousand views. In less than twelve hours, his channel’s traffic had increased tenfold. He wanted to start crying, and he just didn’t know what to do.

 

Slowly, his shock turned to excitement. For some reason, his channel had become popular overnight. Or at least, much more popular than it had been.

 

He looked at the video’s he’d uploaded recently. All of them had also seen a dramatic increase in views. He clicked on his most recent upload, the Minecraft Let’s Play that he’d recorded the previous night, and scrolled down to the comments. For the third time that night, he was completely blown away.

 

_Wow, you’re really good at this, and you’ve got a knack for talking on a microphone. You’ve definitely earned my sub._

-          _RivalRivaille_

 

 


	4. Snowballing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for all the positive responses I've gotten from this fic so far! I freaking love you all. Also this took a bit of research so I'm sorry if anything is slightly off with my terminology!

 

 

A few days had passed since Eren had first discovered his idol had noticed him. In those few days however, a lot had changed. On a personal level, though, he hadn’t changed very much. He still spent his evenings watching YouTube videos, as well as uploading his daily Minecraft Let’s Play.

 

The only difference was now he was being noticed. In the few short days since RivalRivaille had noticed him, his subscriber count had shot up to nearly forty thousand. His view count was averaging twenty to thirty thousand views per video.  In short, he was becoming the happiest boy alive at a breakneck speed.

 

Armin had been shocked to find out that his videos and subscriber count were doing so well. The coconut head had never really cared about uploading videos, or watching any for that matter, but he had always supported Eren no matter what he did. That is what best friends were for, after all. When he’d found out, he’d gotten a look of awe on his face, which quickly changed to delight, followed by an overwhelming excitement. Eren knew he’d picked his best friend well.

 

It was about two in the afternoon. Eren had to work that evening, and he was dreading it. It’s not that he hated his job, far from it; he just hated the dread of knowing he had to work later. Once he was at work, everything was great, but it was the last few hours before having to leave that he truly despised. They did pretty well money wise, too. Because it was a restaurant job, the tips helped out a lot towards buying everything they wanted. Nothing huge, but they never went hungry.

 

Eren had been huddled up in his room much more than usual the last few days. On top of all his daily routines, he now went through each and every comment people made on his videos. It might not sound like it took a lot of time, but they did add up. Each and every positive comment gave him just as much of a warm, happy feeling as it had before, when he was getting one or two a week at most. He was glad that that much hadn’t changed, and he hoped it never would.

 

He finished up looking at his comments, and clicked back to his channel. Much like all the previous times, he just stared at the numbers. He still couldn’t believe it. _I have…I am getting followers by the minute, and people are actually noticing the things I’ve uploaded. And it’s all thanks to you, RivalRivaille. I am more grateful than you will ever know._

 

Content with that thought, he mindlessly opened up his Twitter. It had become a habit for him, opening his Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, and such. He just hadn’t had the chance to over the last few days, due to the fact that he’d been practically glued to YouTube. For the second time in the last few days, his heart practically stopped.

 

His Twitter count had skyrocketed as well. It had gone from roughly three hundred followers to nearly five thousand. Now, to him, that was just as big of a deal as his YouTube account because, while his Twitter account _was_ linked to his YouTube, it wasn’t something he’d thought about checking at all. _Hmm, I wonder what other websites have been affected by this. I haven’t even thought about it. How could so many people consciously switch websites just to follow me, simply because of something someone famous said on YouTube?_

 

Clicking on his notifications box, he saw that he had thousands of notifications. He knew right then that he wouldn’t be able to look at all the comments and posts, and that upset him a little bit. He’d known his whole life that if he ever got famous, he’d eventually hit a point where he couldn’t communicate with each and every person that subscribed or followed him, but it still made him sad. He loved talking to people, but also knew that if he tried to reach out to everyone, he wouldn’t have the time to sleep, let alone continue uploading videos and have any kind of social life.

 

He looked at the top few notifications. Again, he had to do a double take.

 

 

_MyRivaille <3, TheresaLovesRivaille, and 4,093 others liked a Tweet you were mentioned in_

_Nov 4: Seriously, everyone here should check out @ErenJaeger’s YouTube channel. Seriously, this kid is worth watching. His Minecraft videos are A++_

 

He looked down one more notification, and saw that nearly two thousand people had retweeted the post as well. He’d thought he’d gotten used to the feeling of shock, but it hit him again with the force of a shovel. A grin slowly spread on his face as he started scrolling through the comments.

 

Once he’d gone as far as he dared without making the mental commitment to spend his entire evening going through and reply to each and every comment, he clicked out of the notifications window, and back to his main feed. He only followed 53 people on Twitter; he knew following too many people would clog up his feed, and he only really wanted to see posts that interested him.

 

He started scrolling through, not seeing anything too interesting. A laugh here or a smile there was all he got out of it until he saw a post from RivalRivaille. The post itself wasn’t anything interesting, but when his mouse scrolled over his name, a box popped up showing him a small snippet of RivalRivaille’s twitter. He saw the name, the Twitter tag, the tweets, followers, description, and the people he was following. This was all information he already had seen before. What was new, and this floored him more than anything else had so far, was the little box that was greyed out that said “Follows you”.

 

_He’s…following…me…on twitter. Me._

 

While RivalRivaille had millions of followers, he only followed a hundred people on Twitter. In the past, Eren had dreamed of becoming one of his followers. He’d dreamt that being in that elite list of people would grant him tons of followers, due to how many people would follow the people RivalRivaille followed just to try to get closer to him. But this…this was real.

 

This was all becoming too much for Eren to handle, and he was getting overwhelmed. He closed out of twitter, trying to distract himself so he could calm down. Why was he getting this much treatment? Sure, he thought his videos were okay; he had to or he wouldn’t have uploaded them, but this was…this was more than he’d ever expected. This was more than he’d ever dreamed of.

 

One thing that always calmed him down when he was overwhelmed was work. Whether it be school work, cleaning, or his job, anything that distracted him from the matter at hand helped him accept it as true that much quicker. He got up and threw on a coat. It was a little chilly, and even if he wasn’t going far, he wanted to be comfortable. He opened his door and headed to the front door, throwing on his shoes and walking outside.

 

The walk to the mailbox was short. Cold, of course, but short. He opened his box and pulled out the mail. Sorting it into two piles, his and Armin’s, he saw that he had a few bills to pay. _Great._

 

Heading back inside, he wiped his feet on the mat, and going over to the kitchen table, dropped off Armin’s mail in a place where he knew the other would find it. Returning to his room, he shrugged off his coat, making sure to hang it back up on the rack on his door.

 

He opened the first bill. It was from his phone company. The second was from the electrical company. _Oh well, might as well pay these off now. I’m sure I have enough money to pay for these, but I should probably check and make sure. Last thing I need is my bank overdrafting again._

 

Last week, his account had been charged a fifty dollar fee just because his account had gone into the negatives. He wasn’t…bad…with his money, he just knew that he wasn’t in his career job as of yet, so saving wasn’t as important to him. Why should he have to work to save a ton of money in a job that would pay nowhere near what his career job would pay? Now, he had no idea what his career job would be, but that justification had kept him happy for the last few years. Also, as a server, tips were handed out at the end of each night in cash, and he was rather lazy when it came to going to the bank to deposit his money.

 

Logging into his bank account, he answered his security questions and clicked on his checking account. _It was payday yesterday, so I’m sure I’ll have enough. I worked like twenty hours last week, and eighteen the week before, so I should be-_

 

His mouth fell open.

 

There was over two thousand dollars in his bank account.

 

He moved his mouse over to his checking account. Normally in this circumstance, he would have been shaking uncontrollably, but the shock of the situation left him still. He clicked on his history, and saw seventeen payments from Google AdSense, each for exactly one hundred dollars.

 

He had completely forgotten that his videos were monetized.

 

He’d set the threshold on Google AdSense at a hundred dollars. That meant each time his total view count generated a hundred dollars’ worth of income from ads, it would be sent directly to his bank account. Until recently, he’d made a whopping seventeen dollars, and he had been excited for even that to eventually reach a hundred. But this…

 

_I…I’m not broke. In a few days…I’ve made over two thousand dollars._

 

He couldn’t help it. He felt tears coming to his eyes. For the first time in his life, everything was going well for him, and it was all thanks to one man.

 

_Thank you so much, RivalRivaille._

 

 

 

 


	5. Contact

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOW. I'm so happy with the response I've gotten from this fic. Writing it is so much fun, so I'm really glad you all seem to like it! :)

 

 

 

The last week had been absolutely insane.

 

So thought Eren as he walked into the restaurant he and Armin worked at. He had a little piece of paper in his hand, and was nervous as hell.  He’d never done anything like this before, and the simple fact that he was doing it was causing him a ton of worry. What if something were to go wrong?

 

He went into the kitchen, and navigated to the little manager’s office.  Outside the door, he stopped.

 

_Okay, this is it. You can do this, don’t be afraid. You’ve just got to go in there, be strong, and do it._

 

He took one last, big breath, and pushed open the door.

 

His manager, Rico, was sitting in the office. She was typing away at her computer, but turned when Eren closed the door behind him.

 

“Eren, you don’t work today. What can I do for you?” She flashed him a warm smile.

 

“H-Hey, Rico, can I talk to you about something in private?” He asked, feeling as though a thousand rocks were settling themselves in his stomach.

 

She looked at him; one eyebrow raised, and said, “Is it really that time already, Eren? I knew this day would come, but I’m still sad to see it here so soon.” 

 

What was she talking about? “I don’t-“

 

“Listen, Eren. I know the restaurant life isn’t what people would call a ‘career’. Obviously, eventually, every employee here has to move on to something better. That’s why restaurants always have such a large turnover. I know you and your friend Armin, and I knew when I hired you that eventually you both would be meant for bigger and better things. I’m really happy for you, but I’m sad to see one of my best employees go.”

 

Eren was speechless. He’d come in here, speech prepared, ready to have to fight with his manager and explain to her why he had to quit. He didn’t think Rico would be upset, but he did think she would at the very least want an explanation or something.

 

“I-I’m not just going to quit and leave you high and dry.” Eren began, “I am putting in my two weeks. I would never just quit a job, no matter what the reason.”

 

Rico flashed him a very fond smile. “This is why letting you go is so hard. Employees like you are hard to come by. But I could tell from the moment you walked in that something big has happened in your life. We’re overstaffed as it is, and I know Armin has been asking for more hours. If it’s all the same to you, you’re more than welcome to call it today, and get started on whatever it is that you’re doing.”

 

Eren wanted to cry. Out of all of his scenarios that he’d spent the previous night thinking about, he’d never dreamed it would go this smoothly.

 

“Rico…I-I don’t know what to say. Thank you so much.” Overcome with emotion, he did the only thing he could think of, and hugged her.

 

“Hey, Eren, don’t go all soft on me or I’m gonna lose it over here. As you are no longer an employee, technically you aren’t allowed back here anymore. Now, get out of my office and don’t let me see you back here again.”

 

They broke apart. Eren gave her a wide smile, and turned to leave.

 

“Eren, one last thing. No matter what you do, or where life takes you, just take care of yourself, okay? You’re a great kid, and you deserve all the good things that will happen to you.”

 

He wasn’t crying. He wasn’t.

 

 

===============================================

 

 

Three hours later, Eren found himself again in front of his desk. He was staring at his bank account, which had now climbed to over four thousand dollars. He’d had to change the settings on his AdSense account, to withdraw every five-hundred dollars instead of one-hundred, so his history wouldn’t be flooded with so many transactions.

 

He couldn’t believe it. In the week since RivalRivaille had first mentioned him, he’d gone from nothing to being able to quit his job because YouTube was keeping him financially stable. Every single video he uploaded each day was making him over two hundred dollars because of advertisements, and that number would only continue to grow as his follower count increased.

 

Armin had been a little sad to learn he’d be quitting his job. They really liked working together, and they made each other like their job that much more. He understood, though, once Eren showed him just how much his videos were making. “Fuck yeah! You’re finally making it!” was all he’d said, not an ounce of jealousy in his voice.

 

Eren absentmindedly closed out of his bank account, and opened up Twitter. His Twitter had gotten so popular over the week that he could refresh at any time, and he’d have at least one new notification. He’d all but given up on trying to respond to everyone, but still chose to respond here and there, wanting to at least maintain some contact with his followers.

 

He clicked on the little icon that would take him to his account’s Twitter page.

 

He thought he’d gone through all the surprises possible in terms of becoming a famous YouTuber. He was very, very wrong.

 

In the upper left corner, below his picture, and right next to his name, was a little blue check mark. He stared at it, and realization slowly hit him.

 

_I-I’m actually…verified on Twitter._

 

He was floored. Twitter itself had recognized _him_ as important enough to need verification. That verification meant that anyone who went to his twitter would know for a fact that it was his official twitter account. Before all of this had started, that had been the one thing that he’d wanted to accomplish in life. To be important enough to be recognized by the community of Twitter as verified. And here it was…in under a week.

 

For what seemed like the millionth time that week, words were failing him. He was literally at a loss for what he should do next. This had all happened so fast, and it wasn’t a story, or something he’d heard about from someone else…it was actually happening to _him._

 

He closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. It helped to calm him down, and once he was back to normal, a wide grin appeared on his face. Jubilation took over, and he couldn’t help but pump his fist in the air and shout “I did it!”

 

Suddenly, a thought occurred to him. One that he should have thought about days ago, but had neglected to think about because he’d been so overwhelmed. Excitement bubbled up in him as he typed “RivalRivaille” into Twitter’s search box. The username popped up, and he clicked on it.

 

Just as he thought, a new icon had appeared on RivalRivaille’s Twitter page. One that he’d seen on many other people’s pages, but this one excited him more than any before.

 

Next to the usual “Tweet” box that was right under his username, another little, bright green box had appeared. This new box read “Message”. Eren clicked on it, and a new dialog box opened up. He’d always dreamed of this moment, and now that it was actually happening, he could feel the excitement coursing through his body.

 

            **To: RivalRivaille**

**Message:**

Eren thought about what he wanted to say. This was what was known as a “Direct message”, and could only be sent if both users followed each other. The reason this was such a big deal, was because RivalRivaille only followed a hundred people on Twitter. That meant, at most, he could only have a hundred conversations going at once. This meant that no matter what Eren sent here, RivalRivaille would see it, which is why he knew it would have to be a well-crafted message.

 

                **To: RivalRivaille**

**Message:**

**Hey! Sorry it took me so long to say this. It’s been a very…overwhelming week for me, what with all…this…happening. Anyway, I just wanted to say thank you so, so much for everything you’ve  done for me this week. You’ve seriously changed my life, and I don’t know how I’ll ever be able to thank and repay you enough.**

**Eren.**

 

He stared at the message. Was it too much? Was it not enough? Should he add something else to it that would explain just how grateful he really was?

 

He decided not to add or remove anything. He knew that if he didn’t send the message soon, he’d overthink it too much and end up not saying anything at all. He hovered over the ‘send’ button, took a deep breath, and clicked.

 

_There, nothing I can do to take it back now._

 

He waited, and stared at the conversation he’d started.

 

Five minutes went by.

 

He knew if he stared at the post any longer, he’d psych himself out and his stomach would get upset from placebo he’d figuratively stuck in himself, so he decided to close out of the window.

 

Just as he was about to click the little (x), a message appeared.

 

              **To: ErenJaeger**

**Message:**

**Hey Eren! I’ve actually been meaning to message you myself. Normally, this is where I’d say ‘of course, it’s no problem at all’ but…you deserve every follower you have, actually. Your content is really good, and you would have gotten this many views with our without my help. I’m just glad I was able to speed up the process a little.**

**_Levi_ **

**_P.S._ Try not to use that name in public. I’ve worked very hard to keep it off the internet. Thanks, brat.**

 

His name…his name was Levi. He’d decided to share that with…him.

 

 


	6. Levi

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOOH OVER 10K WORDS.

 

_Levi’s POV_

 

Levi very slowly, very meticulously walked through the house.

 

The living room was spotless. The television was dusted on top, and wiped clean with Windex on the front. The pillows on the couches were plump and positioned symmetrically on each side. Any crumbs that may or may not have been on the floor from the previous night were vacuumed up. The picture frames above the fireplace were able to reflect everything in the room, and said fireplace was free of wood shrapnel. In all, he was satisfied.

 

Moving to the Kitchen, he took one last look around. The oven was wiped clean, free of any grease that had been caked on. The dishwasher was running, but he knew any of the plates were already clean enough to eat off of before going in. That’s just how he did dishes. The floors he’d spent a particularly long time on were shining brilliantly. In all, he was satisfied.

 

He walked down the hallway, and berating himself for forgetting, noticed the amount of filth that was on the carpeted floor. Now, to most, it would have looked completely fine, but to Levi, it was unacceptable. He opened up the closet and pulled out his vacuum. Fifteen minutes later, he was satisfied.

 

He made his way up to his room. Opening the door, he flicked on the light switch. The room was exactly how he’d left it; spotless. His bed was made perfectly; not one crease showing in sheets. His desk was devoid of any pencil, paper, or any other material he’d used that morning to write. It was all stowed neatly in his drawers. In all, he was satisfied.

 

Content with the fact that the house was spotless, he moved to the one room in the house that he didn’t mind getting a little messy. His one, true sanctuary. The one place he could go without worry of being bothered by anyone else: His gaming room. There, he wasn’t just Levi. He was RivalRivaille, watched by millions, with total view counts close to the billions.

 

Opening the door, he fondly looked at the setup he’d built. Soundproof walls, floor, and ceiling, with two different microphone setups: One for when he was recording with webcam, and one for without. His mini-fridge sitting next to his desk was full of whatever he fancied at the time, and was always within arm’s reach of his recording spot. He looked over at his computer.

 

Levi was not one to spend a lot of money. If anyone were to walk around the house, they would see that he only spent the bare minimum to live a happy life. His food wasn’t always name brand. His television wasn’t the largest, and he didn’t even have a Smart TV. In fact, he rarely used it at all. When he did, he used Apple TV.

 

It wasn’t that he didn’t have money. To the contrary, his bank account was sitting at nearly five million dollars, but he didn’t feel a need to spend any of that. He just wanted to live a simple life that had small luxuries and nothing more. To him, that was perfection.

 

The one place he did splurge, however, was his computer. He’d built it himself. A ten terabyte hard drive, sixty-four gigs of ram, and a liquid cooling processor that would never, ever overheat were just a few of the specs, and that was just in the tower. His two monitors were both as large as his television in the living room, curved, both with 4k ultra HD capabilities. His mouse and keyboard were both the best money could buy, and were set to both change color in sync to the beat of whatever song he was playing.  His computer was his baby.

 

He sat down at his desk, his chair not making a single squeak or screech, and turned on his computer. Due to the solid state drive he’d incorporated, the system started up in six seconds flat, fully operational and ready to go. He smiled to himself.

 

Growing up, he’d never had much. His family never had a ton of money, and Levi had learned quickly what not to ask for. His family had, however, loved him very much, and he’d learned a lot of respect from the things that growing up poor had taught him.

 

Christmas had always been the one time of the year he’d ever expected anything, as his birthday fell directly on December 25th. This was the main reason he had yet to spend more than the bare minimum on the rest of the household. Going from unable to spend anything to being able to afford everything hadn’t changed him in the slightest, for which he was very grateful.

 

He opened up his D-drive, the one he’d partitioned to keep all of his videos in, and clicked on the “Ready to upload” folder. He was satisfied to see seven videos ready to go. He uploaded two videos a day. The first was a ‘let’s play’, where he would play through whatever series he was currently on. The second was a ‘let’s look at’, where he would try out new games, and see if his fans wanted them to be the next series that moved to the let’s play section. He always liked to stay a few days ahead of schedule, just in case anything went wrong.

 

He swiveled the microphone to his left around so it was directly in front of him, and opened up his recording software, as well as the game he’d been recording, _Until Dawn._ If everything went according to plan, this would be the second to last episode he’d need to record before the series would end. He loved the series, and was sad to see it end, but his favorite part about recording was starting something new. That’s why he always favored the ‘let’s look at’ portion of his channel.

 

Once the game was loaded up, Levi took a deep breath, and started recording.

 

_Hello, everyone, and welcome back to another Let’s Play Until Dawn! Last time, we were a little unlucky, and Sam had a…pretty gruesome death. That made me quite upset, as I want everyone to live, so I did something crazy. I’ve been doing a little bit of research, and I decided to start over completely from the beginning, and go through every single step again to get to where we were last video, so I can save Sam. I already did that off camera, so you guys wouldn’t have to see like twenty hours of gameplay that you’ve already seen, and now we’re back where we left off last episode. This time, though, Sam is alive!_

 

His commentary lasted around twenty minutes. One of the best parts about recording so many episodes was that his internal clock was able to tell him when it was time to end a video. He was almost never wrong, either, always ending the video between eighteen and twenty-two minutes. That was the perfect amount of time for a let’s play video. If a video was too short, people would beg for more and call him cheap for not uploading videos that were long enough. If the video was too long, people would get bored of his content and stop watching altogether.

 

Once he’d said his signature goodbye, he ended the recording. Shortly after, he opened the video editing software he’d dropped nearly a grand on, and set to work. It was super easy, and very convenient to use. It was the type of software that was easy to learn, but difficult to master. Levi had finally hit the point where he’d learned everything about the technology. The video was edited and ready to go within minutes.

 

He opened up Steam, and took a look at the current sales going on. Steam was having one of those super sales; where like half of the website was on sale. The sale was ending soon, and he’d neglected to actually buy everything he’d added to his cart until now. He clicked on the cart, and saw almost fifty items in it. Still…most of the things he’d added were games he knew he’d be bored with within minutes. _Nothing too exciting. I’ve actually already played most of these games. I wonder if I’ll ever run out of interesting things to record._

 

He clicked on the “New” portion of Steam, and saw that over a hundred new games had come out that day. _Hah, like that will happen. I could probably play a game during every single hour I’m awake, and still never run out of content._

 

Smiling to himself, knowing his job was quite secure, he started uploading a video he’d recorded a few days ago. YouTube told him it would be ready in twenty minutes, so he partook in his favorite hobby, and started browsing the internet.

 

Facebook was boring, as usual. His fan page had almost seventy-five thousand new comments. He didn’t even bother reading them anymore. Occasionally, he would read one, maybe two comments, but he just didn’t have the time to go through even a single percent of them.

 

With fifteen minutes left to spare, Levi typed the ‘Y’ into Google chrome, and was taken to YouTube. He clicked on the ‘subscription’ tab, and started scrolling through. He didn’t subscribe to too many YouTubers, maybe thirty or so. He continued to scroll, until a pang of excitement shot through him. One he’d only recently started experiencing.

 

ErenJaeger had uploaded a new video.

 

He assumed Eren Jaeger was the kid’s real name. In his profession, it was very common that people who didn’t think they’d ever actually get famous would use their real names to upload videos. It didn’t matter too much, but Levi was proud of the fact that, apart from the elite few he’d elected to include, not a single person knew his real name. It was known by everyone who followed him that he didn’t divulge it, and people had been trying to find it for years.

 

Excitedly, Levi clicked on the new video Eren had uploaded. He was elated to see that the video had already gotten over twenty thousand views. _Good on him. The kid deserves it! His videos are so good!_ As the thought hit him, so did the surprise. He was…never this nice. The few people he actually considered as friends knew him to be a short-tempered prick, and not without good reason. Yet here he was, complimenting someone he’d never met, someone who, by all rights, he should consider competition.

 

Eren’s videos were about the same length as his own. This particular video was on a game that he’d never actually played on his channel: Minecraft. It wasn’t that he found the game boring, quite the contrary; he just didn’t get the game. There were so many different mods, and learning everything about it was…such a commitment. He’d gotten many comments in the past from people asking him to make Minecraft videos, but he’d never listened to them. Not until one.

 

He didn’t know what it was that led him to read Eren’s post, and had absolutely no idea why he had decided to click on the guy’s channel, spend almost five hours watching his videos, and finally go back and sort through until he found the comment again so he could reply to it.

 

He knew that he’d singlehandedly brought Eren into the light, but he also knew that the kid’s content was so good that he’d have gotten there eventually. The kid just had…natural talent. His voice was also super relaxing. Listening to it had already made falling asleep easier for him. He also liked that Eren uploaded videos every day. It meant he always could count on watching at least one video before going to sleep.

 

Once the video finished, he checked back on his own. It had been up for about four minutes, and already, he had almost a hundred-thousand hits. _Wow, that might actually be a record for me._

 

He was used to it by now, though, and the excitement was short lived. He clicked on twitter, and started looking at everyone’s status updates. _Boring. Boring. Boring, boring, boring._

 

Again, excitement filled him as a little green (1) appeared next to his ‘messages’ tab. Clicking on it, he saw that Eren had finally replied to his comment. Well, it had only been like an hour, but still. An entire hour was a long time.

 

           **To: RivalRivaille**

**Message:**

**Oh my god, thank you…thank you so much for everything. Like, getting me famous is absolutely amazing and this week has been the best of my life but…you’ve always been the biggest inspiration in everything I do on YouTube…so thank you so much for sharing your name with me. That means a lot.**

**Eren.**

 

Levi felt something in his chest. He didn’t know what it was. It felt…like his chest was tightening, but also loosening up at the same time. He figured it was a strange form of indigestion, and made a mental note to take some Tylenol later.

 

He clicked the ‘reply’ button, and started typing.

 

              **To: ErenJaeger**

**Message:**

**It’s…not that big of a deal. Just don’t tell anyone, please. There are only a handful of people who know my name, and even less that aren’t my real life friends. As for everything else, like I said, you would have gotten there eventually. Your content is really good. Like…really, really good. I don’t know why you had as few followers as you did, and I’m just glad I could help.**

**Levi.**

He clicked the send button. It wasn’t time to ask yet. He’d just met the guy and he didn’t even know if Eren was that type of person. Still, what with the progression of his own videos, he knew the time to ask was vastly approaching.

 

Standing, Levi left the room. It was getting late, and he hadn’t had dinner yet. He walked down to his kitchen, thankful he’d gone to the store earlier that day. Setting the stove on medium heat, he got to work making himself an omelet. Breakfast for dinner had always been his favorite.

 

He chopped up onions, red and orange peppers, and mushrooms. He wasn’t a fan of mushrooms, but knew how healthy they were, and since he couldn’t taste them in the omelet, he didn’t mind throwing them in.

 

Throwing it all in a pan to sauté, he started cooking bits of sausage and cheese, and once they were done, combined all the ingredients into one pan, and used the other to make his omelet.

 

Once the omelet was complete, he made his way back upstairs and sat down at his computer. Content, he started eating, thankful that he’d kept napkins within arm’s reach of…well…everywhere.

 

He reopened twitter, doubting Eren had replied. It had only been twenty minutes, after all. He was excited to see the little (1) had appeared on the messages tab again, and clicked on the message.

 

           **To: RivalRivaille**

**Message:**

**That…that means so much coming from you holy crap. You’re an amazing YouTuber yourself, and the fact that you noticed my channel just makes everything that much better.**

**Eren.**

 

Once again, that strange feeling coursed through him.

 

Was it time? Should he ask now?

 

He thought about how he should phrase the question. He figured Eren would say yes, but he didn’t want to seem too…forward? He never asked to do this kind of thing with people. Sure, tons of other people had asked him, but he’d never given them any real thought. That was also part of what he was afraid of. Levi feared rejection, which is why he’d been solo for so long.

 

Sighing, he started typing out his response.

 

           **To: ErenJaeger**

**Message:**

**Well thank you, Eren. Actually, there’s something I wanted to ask you. Your channel…it’s very specific towards Minecraft. I know nothing about it, and wanted to know if you…wanted to collab with me and do a series together. Let me know soon, my series will be ending and it will open up a free slot on my channel to do a new series.**

**Levi.**

 

He hovered over the send button, wondering what repercussions would come from that one click. Sighing, and knowing he’d have to do it eventually, he pressed the button. _There, nothing I can do about it now._

 

With that, he was out of things to do with the day, so he got up and left the room. It was getting rather late, and he was feeling rather tired, so he decided to call it a night. He slowly made his way into his bathroom, brushed his teeth, and took out his contacts.

 

Crossing the hall, he opened the door to his bedroom. He made his way over to his dresser and, pulling out his pajamas, changed, and then tucked himself in under the covers of his bed.

 

He reached under the opposite side of his bed, and grabbed his power cable. Plugging his phone in, he turned it on, excitedly went to twitter, and checked his messages.

 

Nothing.

 

 


	7. Progress

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I still don't have a beta, so let me know if you find mistakes!

Eren woke to the sound of Armin getting ready for work. The smell of breakfast was in the air, which almost instantly pulled him out of his dreary state. He got up, threw on his pajamas, and headed out to the kitchen. Armin was bustling around, looking quite unhappy to be in his predicament.

 

“I thought you weren’t supposed to work today, Arm” Eren said, yawning into his hand.

 

“Yeah, I flippin’ wasn’t. Well, I was the on-call, but I didn’t think anyone would actually call out. I close tonight, too. It’s going to be a long ass day, which sucks, but I didn’t have anything planned, so I guess the extra hours are nice.”

 

Eren sat down at the kitchen counter, on which Armin had placed a heaping plate of eggs, bacon, and hash browns. He greedily dug in, thankful that he had such a great roommate.

 

Armin continued running back and forth between his room, grabbing all of the things he would be needing for his shifts that day. Eren watched him, content to sit there and not do anything else. With everything that had been happening, it was nice to just…have a break from it all for a little bit and let things return to normal. _Well, whatever ‘normal’ is anymore._

 

Eren felt bad that the small blonde had to work all day. He’d considered offering to just pay both their rents, as he was making more than enough money and had nothing to spend it on, but knew Armin would never agree to that. He had worked too hard his entire life to let anyone pay for anything for him. Eren knew he would just get mad if he offered, so he had decided against it.

 

“Alright, dude, I’m off to work. I’ll see you on my break, possibly. If not, I’ll see you tomorrow morning!”

 

“Sounds good! I hope you make millions today at work!”

 

“Fuck you.”

 

With that, Armin shut the door, leaving Eren alone in the house.

 

He sat there, still content in his morning-like state, until his plate was empty. He stood up, walked over to the sink, and rinsed them off, before putting them in the dishwasher. He looked around, seeing if there was anything else he could tidy up. Seeing nothing, he filled a cup up with water, and returned to his room.

 

He sat down at his desk, a happy sigh escaping his lips. His chair was probably his favorite part about recording. It was something he’d gotten for his birthday, and it was, to him, the most comfortable piece of furniture in the household.

 

He pressed the power button on his computer, and while he was waiting for it to start up, pulled out his phone and checked all of his usual social media sites. Sure, his computer would be ready to do just that in a few minutes, but why should he waste the time sitting around doing nothing, when he had a perfectly good phone capable of surfing the web?

 

There wasn’t anything interesting on Facebook, and his Twitter was as boring as usual. In fact, the statuses were so uninteresting that he closed out of the app, not noticing the little (1) next to his messages box. He’d completely forgotten about his conversation from the night before. The one that had kept him bouncing in his chair, and unable to sleep until pretty late in the morning.

 

Once his computer was fully operational, he opened up his recording software, as well as Minecraft, and set to work. He’d made a mental note to himself to record five full episodes that day, so he could be ahead of schedule for the next week. He didn’t have anything planned, he just figured it was a good idea, now that he was actually getting noticed by the gaming community.

 

Due to the speed at which he was getting recognized, and the overnight, life changing event that was him being noticed by a celebrity, his commentary seemed to be improving. Before, Eren had been worried that his commentary wasn’t to par, and that’s why his follower base had been growing at such a slow pace. Now, though, knowing so many people were watching his content actually made him feel much more at ease with his recordings. It was a bit more stressful, not knowing how his fanbase would react to his uploads, but knowing they were being watched at all was a huge confidence booster.

 

Three hours later, Eren was wrapping up his seventh video. He hadn’t meant to get so far ahead of himself, but he was having such a fun time that he just…wanted to continue.  

 

_-for power, I’m going to be building some energy conduits and some liquid transfer pipes. I’ll also probably need some liquid transfer nodes to carry the molten redstone from point A to point B. But…I think that’s a good place to stop. If you guys like the video, please let me know! As always, subscribe if you’re new, or don’t, I’ll love you regardless. See you tomorrow!_

 

He pressed f4, which was his video capture hotkey, and muted his microphone. Sitting back in his chair, he thought, _man, I was so productive today! Seven episodes ready to go! That’s going to give me a lot of extra time later to catch up on all the YouTube series I’ve fallen behind on recently._

 

Opening up his editing software, he set to work getting all seven videos ready for uploading. He’d never edited this many videos in one sitting, but today he was feeling quite energetic, and decided to bust all of them out in one go. The whole process took nearly two hours.

 

He sat back in his chair, and let out a content sigh. Laid out before him were seven fully edited videos, ready to be uploaded at a moment’s notice. He was so happy with himself! He’d never binged this many recordings and edits before, so this was quite the accomplishment.

 

With that happy notion, he started uploading the first video.

 

_I just…I can’t believe how much has happened in such a short amount of time. Knowing this video will get over a hundred-thousand hits…that’s a hundred thousand people watching my video in under 24 hours. That’s almost two-hundred dollars that I’m going to get, just from ad revenue…I can’t believe I’ve gotten to the point where, if I wanted, say, a new iPod, all I would have to do is upload one, maybe two videos._

 

The money wasn’t really important to him. It was just the fact that he _could_ if he wanted to that was such a big deal. He saw that the video had about ten minutes left, so he opened up a new tab and went to Twitter. This time, though, he instantly saw the new message in his inbox, and berated himself for forgetting the conversation with his idol the previous night. Clicking on it, he saw the message Levi had left for him the previous night.

 

           **To: ErenJaeger**

 

**Message:**

**Well thank you, Eren. Actually, there’s something I wanted to ask you. Your channel…it’s very specific towards Minecraft. I know nothing about it, and wanted to know if you…wanted to collab with me and do a series together. Let me know soon, my series will be ending and it will open up a free slot on my channel to do a new series.**

 

**Levi**

 

He sat there, not moving, just staring at the message. He read it over three times in his head, just to make sure he was understanding the message correctly. Levi…RivalRivaille, wanted to collab with…him. The man that he’d looked up to since nearly his first day on YouTube wanted to make a series, on either his channel or Eren’s, with…him.

 

He looked over at the time stamp, and saw that it had been sent shortly after his own message the previous night. He cursed at himself again, feeling both stupid because he’d forgotten, and worried because he knew RivalRivaille only had a short window of time before he’d start a new series. Eren just hoped he’d read the message before it was too late. Hastily, he typed out a response.

 

           **To: RivalRivaille**

 

**Message:**

**Holy shit. Of course, I would love to do a collab with you! Are you kidding me? Like is this a big joke that I’m just not getting? Because this is…this is such a big deal and I just want to know that you’re actually serious before I get all excited. And about Minecraft no less! A game that I might actually have more knowledge than you on! Thank you so much, Levi!**

****Eren** **

 

He hit the send button, not even bothering to proofread, knowing time was of the essence. He also turned on his phone notifications on Twitter, so he’d know the second RivalRivaille responded, if he did.

 

By now, his video had uploaded. Happy to have an excuse not to think about how he might have just missed his chance, he clicked on the link to the video, and watched the first few minutes just to make sure there weren’t any editing issues. He was just about to close out, when his phone lit up, with a message from Twitter.

 

_You have one unread message._

 

Excitedly, he opened up a new browser, and went to twitter. Anticipation filled him as he clicked on the message box, and read Levi’s response:

 

           **To: ErenJaeger**

 

**Message:**

**No, brat, this isn’t a joke. Although I’m flattered that you thought it was. Yeah, I’d like to start a collab with you on Minecraft, if you’re willing. I’d like to do it on my channel, because like I said, I have a spot opening up on my series list. What is your Skype username? I’ll add you and we can discuss things further on there.**

****Levi** **

 

 

 


	8. The First Call

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I AM SO SORRY IT'S TAKEN ME THIS LONG TO UPLOAD THIS CHAPTER. 
> 
> I hit huge writer's block, and haven't been able to progress. Today, though, I just decided "Fuck it I'm going to write", and this is the result. 
> 
> I've also been super busy with my voice acting on Tumblr, which you can find me at www.attackonshawn.tumblr.com. I do Eremin, Ereri, Seraph of hte End, Haikyuu, Black Butler, and many other voice work.
> 
> Anyway, enough rambling, here's the chapter!

This was it. This was the moment he’d been dreaming about for years.

 

Eren took a deep breath. It really wasn’t like him to be this antsy and nervous. Sure, he fidgeted quite a lot, and was prone to bouts of nervous outbursts just like everyone else, but this was different. He stared at his Skype page, seeing many green boxes next to friendly faces, showing they were online, but none were the one he wanted to see. The one he didn’t even know if he would anymore.  

 

He was getting ahead of himself. Levi hadn’t even added him yet. It wasn’t like a ton of time had passed. Nothing suggested something had gone wrong yet. He was acting foolish, and needed to do something about it. Sighing, he got up and left the room, deciding it was better to preoccupy himself with dishes or something; something that would take his mind and nerves off the situation at hand.

 

_No, brat, this isn’t a joke. Although I’m flattered that you thought it was. Yeah, I’d like to start a collab with you on Minecraft, if you’re willing. I’d like to do it on my channel, because like I said, I have a spot opening up on my series list. What is your Skype username? I’ll add you and we can discuss things further on there._

 

He’d read it so many times before responding that he had it memorized. Of all the monumental events that had fallen into his lap, this was the big one. The _crème de la crème._ He couldn’t see how, apart from actually releasing the videos, things could possibly get better for him after this. He wasn’t complaining, though. As his hands started to wrinkle under the hot water, a feeling that had always relaxed him, he felt his erratic brain begin to calm down.

 

After reading Levi’s reply, Eren had typed out a hasty _‘Great! My username is ErenJaeger. Super interesting, I know. Just let me know when you’re on. I’ve got nothing to do with my day, so take your time.’_

 

He’d stared at the message for over an hour. Was it enough? Did it say too much? Was he being childish in the presence of his idol? This was a very important message, because if he said too much, he might scare the other away. If he didn’t say enough, his message might be taken as offensive. He’d thought about the many different things he could change, add, and remove, but settled on sending the message verbatim.

 

That was all that had happened up to his current situation. Over two hours had gone by, and Levi still hadn’t replied to him. He was probably busy or something, but Eren’s mind had wandered and overthought, until he’d come up with hundreds of worst-case scenarios. He knew his fears were groundless. But if there were one thing he was good at, it was overthinking and worrying too much. Not really a skill useful for everyday life.

 

Still, knowing his skillsets in life were few and far between made him all the more grateful for what Levi had done for him. No matter how many times he told Eren it was nothing, the brunette would always be appreciative.

 

Once the dishes were finished, he dried his hands on the towel next to the sink, and made his way back into his room.

 

The sight that awaited him left him excited and terrified.

 

A new name had popped up in his Skype directory. _RivalRivaille – Online._ This excited him. What terrified him was the two missed calls he’d received, as well as the little message right below them.

 

_“Hey, are you there, brat?”_

 

He hadn’t even been gone that long! It couldn’t have been more than fifteen minutes. Berating himself, he quickly sat in his chair and typed up a quick “Yeah. Sorry, I was doing dishes. You still online?” and waited.

 

The reply came quicker than he was expecting. The little pen lit up, showing that the other was typing, and after a moment, a message appeared.

 

“Yeah. Are you free to have a call now?”

 

This time, very quickly, he typed out “Yes” and waited. He could feel the familiar nervousness settling in his stomach, but this time…it was mixed with excitement. He was about to actually meet his idol. Sure, it wasn’t in person, but this was the next best thing.

 

Then, it appeared. A sound he’d heard many times in the last few years, but never had it sent a shock through him like this. Skype’s notification sound that someone was calling him blared through his speakers. _His speakers!? Shit._

 

He quickly plugged in his microphone, and threw on his headset, answering the call as soon as he’d made sure his computer settings were using the device, not the speakers themselves. _Nothing like deafening your idol to mark a first call with them._ He was very quickly brought out of this thought process, however.

 

“Jesus Christ, took you long enough. I thought you were going to leave me hanging a third time.”

 

_His voice…_ “N-no!” Eren began, “I-I just forgot to plug in my headset, and didn’t want it coming through the speakers. That would have sounded horrible on your end, so I decided to fix it before c-calling. I’m s-sorry.”

 

He felt his face heating up at how nervous he sounded. There was nothing he could do to help it.

 

“Relax, I was only joking” Levi replied, and Eren could tell he found it amusing. “Anyway, we’re here now, that’s all that matters. I don’t have any recordings for an hour or so, so you’ve got until then to convince me to play this Minecraft bullshit.”

 

Eren felt a pang of unease. _He hasn’t decided to play yet? I’m not ready to sell this game to him!_ He took a deep, shaky breath, and said, “W-well…It’s a really cool game. You- you can build and destroy things…and get attacked…and-“

 

He was cut off. “Answer me this, Jaeger. Are you nervous right now?”

 

After a short pause, “Extremely.”

 

“Then get it out. I’ll give you a few minutes to say whatever you want, and won’t let it have any effect on how we interact afterwards, okay? I get that I am quite famous. I don’t mean that in a ‘full of myself’ kind of way it’s just… I’ve dealt with situations like this before, and found that this is the best way to go about it. Better than me yelling at you until you piss yourself. Don’t want to go down that road again.”

 

Eren snorted. He couldn’t help it. And with that snort, an intense weight seemed to lift. “Are you…sure?”

 

“I wouldn’t be saying it if I wasn’t sure. Go ahead. Even if I don’t take it into account for future conversation, I’ll do my best to help you with it here and now. Shoot.”

 

_You…you are absolutely amazing, Levi…_ He didn’t say this of course, instead choosing a more tactful approach. “Well, I know I’ve typed it out, but I still just have this huge feeling of gratitude and awe. You have changed my life so much, Levi, and I don’t know how I’ll ever repay you. It might not be a big deal for you but…I’m so thankful. Also, I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced what I’m going through right now but…you are literally my idol. Other people have famous actors, singers, or artists but…you have been mine since the day you started creating videos. I don’t know how to get over that feeling, so I apologize for that.” He finished, letting the last few words die out quietly, feeling somewhat embarrassed with himself for his honesty.

 

There was an uncomfortably long pause, long enough to the point that Eren started to fear he’d said too much. He was about to apologize for just that, when Levi spoke.

 

“I’m honored, Eren, truly. I’ve heard that before, from many people throughout the years, but none have really hit home like yours just now. It’s always been in message form but…hearing that, just now…I just…thank you, Eren…Okay. Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, I have to ask you this: Are you always going to see me on a pedestal over you? Because that’s where it will start to be a problem. You have good, no, great commentary, Eren. Never forget that. I want to make a series with you, which means, to me at least, you must have some sort of value.”

 

Normally, If anyone else had ended their speech like that, he would have been offended. With Levi, however, he felt…good. It was as though Levi had known exactly which words to use in the situation, because most of the fear he’d felt had melted away. Now, he just felt excitement. He was going to make a series with his idol! This was the chance of a lifetime, and he was _not_ going to screw this up.

 

Confidence renewed, Eren said, “No. I am not going to see you like that forever. Thank you, what you just said means a lot to hear, and I won’t forget it. Now, Minecraft is a sandbox style game where-“

 

Eren talked for what felt like hours. He explained most mechanics of the game, without getting too detailed, and then talked about the different mods that they could use, once Levi learned enough about vanilla Minecraft, also known as the original version. Throughout the entire conversation, Levi didn’t say a word, except when Eren was afraid the call had dropped, and had to check to make sure he was still on the other end.

 

Once he finished, he began to feel a little uneasy again. Levi hadn’t said anything throughout his explanation, and he was wondering if the game truly bored him that much. Then the other spoke.

 

“Well, I can certainly tell you’re passionate about this, Eren.” Levi began, “And after an explanation like that, I don’t see how anyone on the planet would pass up an opportunity to learn from you. I’ll go buy an account now, and we can start playing some regular Minecraft. I don’t want to record yet though, if that’s okay, until I know more of the basics. Our first series should be modded, and I don’t want to know anything about the mods until we actually record. Teach me everything live. Does that sound acceptable to you?”

 

Eren tried not to think about the implications “Our first series” could have, but the thought that he would possibly be open to more than one in the future gave him… _butterflies._ This was new.

 

“Y-yeah! That sounds perfect! I would love to play now but…don’t you have to record? It’s been almost an hour…”

 

A brief pause, then, “Shit. Yeah, I guess time got away from me. Sorry about that.”

 

“No! Don’t be sorry for that. I’d feel horrible playing with you, knowing you still have to record. That takes priority. If you want to play when you’re done, I’ll be down. If not, we can play tomorrow, does that work?”

 

“Yeah. Thank you for understanding, Eren. You don’t know what that means to me. And thank you for taking so much time to explain the game to me. I actually find myself looking forward to it; something I never thought I’d say. I’m going to go record now, though. Talk to you later, okay?”

 

“Sounds good!”

 

He’d thought about this conversation a lot over the last few hours, and always thought their goodbye would leave him sad but…when the call finally dropped, and he was left alone in his room…a giant smile appeared on his face, and refused to leave. His life was about to change, yet again, and he’d never felt this much excitement in his entire life.

 

_Once again, it’s all thanks to you, Levi._

 

 


End file.
